'The hype is real. And if Desktop Metal delivers on its promises – that it can make reliable metal printing up to 100 times faster, with 10 times cheaper initial costs and 20 times cheaper materials costs than existing laser technologies, using a much wider range of alloys – these machines might be the tipping point for large scale 3D manufacturing.

'The company is putting forward two systems: a studio system aimed at rapid, cheap metal prototyping for engineering groups, and a production system for mass manufacture.'